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<blockquote data-quote="Balesir" data-source="post: 6197353" data-attributes="member: 27160">I find MBTI quite insightful, but it's not really an &quot;alignment&quot; system in any meaningful way. It's about natural predispositions and preferences rather than allegiances or value systems. That could make it handy as an aide/guide to roleplaying a character (although fighting against ones own type will be hard for many/most people), but it makes it fairly useless as a driver for thematic conflict/drama.Thanks for the reply! I am very strictly an amateur-but-interested in moral philosophy (and in how it relates to my developing discipline of economics).I don't think D&amp;D alignment as it is typically used has L/C as &quot;ethics&quot;, really - just a sort of rather confused dichotomy between following a set of rules and &quot;doing what feels right/appropriate&quot;.Even the &quot;duty to others&quot; thing gets hinky, because of the clash between Kantian and Utilitarian concepts of &quot;good&quot;. This is really noticeable in economics; an example situation would be:- Consider that each individual is born with a (variable) quantity of what we'll call &quot;talent&quot;.- Someone with 1 &quot;unit&quot; of talent could make one widget per day; someone with two units of talent could make 2 widgets per day, and so on.- There are as many &quot;2 talent&quot; people as there are &quot;1 talent&quot; people.- Everyone needs one widget per day and values leisure time at the same rate.Is it &quot;moral&quot; to force the people with 2 &quot;units&quot; of &quot;talent&quot; to work all day every day (rather than the half a day they would need to work to make their one widget), on the grounds that the less talented folks will then get to rest all day long, leading to the maximum benefit overall (everyone gets one widget and half the population get full time leisure as opposed to everyone getting one widget and half the population getting half the time as leisure)?Maximising total utility can suggest some pretty unpalatable-sounding solutions. Ideas of non-coercion and non-linear utility can add a lot to the discussion, but the central dichotomy still tends to remain.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Balesir, post: 6197353, member: 27160"] I find MBTI quite insightful, but it's not really an "alignment" system in any meaningful way. It's about natural predispositions and preferences rather than allegiances or value systems. That could make it handy as an aide/guide to roleplaying a character (although fighting against ones own type will be hard for many/most people), but it makes it fairly useless as a driver for thematic conflict/drama. Thanks for the reply! I am very strictly an amateur-but-interested in moral philosophy (and in how it relates to my developing discipline of economics). I don't think D&D alignment as it is typically used has L/C as "ethics", really - just a sort of rather confused dichotomy between following a set of rules and "doing what feels right/appropriate". Even the "duty to others" thing gets hinky, because of the clash between Kantian and Utilitarian concepts of "good". This is really noticeable in economics; an example situation would be: - Consider that each individual is born with a (variable) quantity of what we'll call "talent". - Someone with 1 "unit" of talent could make one widget per day; someone with two units of talent could make 2 widgets per day, and so on. - There are as many "2 talent" people as there are "1 talent" people. - Everyone needs one widget per day and values leisure time at the same rate. Is it "moral" to [I][B]force[/B][/I] the people with 2 "units" of "talent" to work all day every day (rather than the half a day they would need to work to make their one widget), on the grounds that the less talented folks will then get to rest all day long, leading to the maximum benefit overall (everyone gets one widget and half the population get full time leisure as opposed to everyone getting one widget and half the population getting half the time as leisure)? Maximising total utility can suggest some pretty unpalatable-sounding solutions. Ideas of non-coercion and non-linear utility can add a lot to the discussion, but the central dichotomy still tends to remain. [/QUOTE]

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